Right Before Everything Changed
The final few weeks of Lauren's pregnancy were marked with all the anticipation and trepidation that is expected for first time parents. Friends and family put forward guesses as to her arrival date, which varied by as much as 14 days. My money was on 1 week premature. Fail.
As we watched that date come and go, the excitement of her impending arrival compounded with each passing day. In those last four to five days leading up to her due date, we naturally stayed closer to home, my cell phone was constantly at the ready (assuming I didn't leave it somewhere, which spurred panic followed by a frantic search to track it down), and the car always had more than 3/4 of a tank of gas. We ate some super spicy curry the night before Anabel was born, which many claim helps start labour. We did the same thing the week before, but no dice, so go figure. We also took long walks around the neighbourhood, which given the uncharacteristically long and amazing summer we've been having, has been magic.
Here's a look down of of the streets in Kensington. We love the white Victorian mansion blocks. This sort of blue sky is rare in London, so had to snap a picture.
We see interesting things on our walks. For instance, in the side yard of one multimillion pound mansion, we saw what I can only guess is a pet cemetery with small headstones to boot. Not something you see every day anyway, but also because land and space are so incredibly scarce and valuable. People make use of every inch of space, as seen below with driveways built within a hair of living room windows. One tap of the gas at the wrong time would create an unfortunate, instant garage.
On the day before Anabel was born, we went to breakfast at one of our favorite spots, Kensington Square Kitchen. We've mentioned this place before, but it's worth another shout-out because it's just so good. They have delicious breakfast/brunch dishes like omelettes, eggs, greek yogurt, coffees, etc. The great things is that they are consistently good. Anyway, we went there and talked about how our lives were going to change and that we were on the edge between the part of our lives where there were two of us and the part of our lives where there would be three. It was the kind of philosphical conversation that made my head hurt and my heart happy.
After breakfast, we visited St. Mary Abbots church for Sunday service. The churches in London are incredible both from historical and architectural perspectives. Not only that, there are hundreds and hundreds throughout the city. Quick side note - this is a perfect example of why you shouldn't trust everything you read on the internet. I Googled, "how many churches are there in london" to try and get an accurate count for this post. One of the sites had the following entry, which said that there were 35 churches in London. Only 35! The kicker is that in the picture, you can see that 10 people found that article helpful. That means that there are no less than 10 very misled folks out there.
I digress .The church has classic stained glass windows, statues adorning entryways, beautiful courtyards and stone construction.
The view from the nave was impressive. The interior boasted high, vaulted ceiling and arches. The stone construction (from 1872 according to Wikipedia) made the temperature cool inside and it was the perfect venue to listen to the chorus of a choir.
There are plenty of old wives' tales about things pregnant women can do to jump-start labor. Medical science says clinical trials don't support them, but what's the harm in trying? I remember one of the forums I read had a comment saying that people tend to just attribute whatever they most recently did as a catalyst to labor. For us, if we were to assume correlation equals causation, then to get labor going we just needed to eat a spicy curry dinner, go for a long walk, go to eat breakfast at our favorite restaurant followed by a choral church service. Lauren started contractions at 4am the next morning and theret was no going back.